


Numb

by Emsiem



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: But Sans will be sad, Eventual Smut, Experimental Story, F/F, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Gen, I don't actually have any idea where I'm going with this, Jealousy, M/M, Multi, Netorare, Other, SO SAD, Slow Burn, ntr
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-09
Updated: 2016-06-09
Packaged: 2018-07-14 02:13:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7148192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emsiem/pseuds/Emsiem
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Relationships never lasted long for you. It would start off with a fiery passion, but then the heat could never sustain itself. As much as you wanted to fall in love, you'd just end up hurting them. So you ended up avoiding anything serious and now you're pretty much a lone wolf.</p>
<p>Enter a chill skeleton dude who seems to have you second-guessing yourself. He's pretty cool and he makes you laugh. But this is just a brief infatuation. Nothing serious, right?</p>
            </blockquote>





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**Author's Note:**

> This is my first time actually writing fanfiction. Please let me know if there are any errors. Thank you.

It’s just past 5 in the late afternoon and you’ve just finished the last of your work. You stretch and groan; the day has been long and you haven’t moved from your office chair in hours. Packing up your stuff, you wave a brief goodbye to your coworkers before stepping out the double glass doors to the parking lot right outside the building. There’s a brief moment where the sun shines right in your eyes and you have to squint to see where your car is parked. Driving west back home right now would suck.

So you don’t. Instead, you drive southeast to a bar that you’d discovered two weeks ago. It’s a fairly new bar called Grillby’s and though the majority of its patrons are monsters, the great food and drinks have attracted an increasing number of humans as well. You weren’t able to stay long last time since you just stopped in for a pickup order of burger and fries but tonight you wanted to relax.

There’s convenient parking on the street and you stop around the corner on the same block. The walk allows you to clear your head a little more and you can smell the smoky-smooth scent of grilled meat wafting from the bar. Your stomach growls a bit and you smile in anticipation. When you open the door and step in, you’re hit with a wall of heat. Despite the high temperature, you’re actually comforted by the warmth. You make your way over to the bar counter and hop on one of the high stools near the end of its length. Grillby, the fire elemental who owns the bar, walks over to you behind the bar. He wordlessly looks at you and you somehow intuit that he’s asking for your order. You tell him you’d like a cheeseburger, no fries please. He nods and leaves, exiting through a door in the back, presumably to the kitchen.

While you’re waiting and browsing social media on your phone, you hear the entrance door opening behind you and then a chorus of happy exclamations. Curious, you peek over your shoulder and see a stout skeleton monster sporting a blue hoodie greet the other bar patrons with a wide, toothy smile. “Sans!” they all cheer. “heya,” he replies. Judging by his reception, this “Sans” must be a regular. But that’s none of your concern, so you turn back to your phone.

The skeleton perches himself on another stool at the very end of the bar, just a seat away from your own. After a few moments, you can feel his not-so-subtle glances at you and it slightly bothers you. You lift your head and look at him, catching him mid-stare and his grin widens. At the arch of your inquiring eyebrow, he says “hey.” You say “hey” back. He asks for your name. Even though you already know his, you tell him that it’s only polite to tell his name first before wanting yours. More widening of his grin and he acquiesces, introducing himself as “sans, sans the skeleton.” You give your name and title as a human to copy his introduction. Before you can say anything else, Grillby comes back out of the presumed kitchen with your burger. The smell is intoxicating and you greedily lick your lips. You don’t notice Sans’ pupils dilate as he sees your hunger.

Grillby sets the plate of food in front of you before glancing at Sans. Without a second thought, he reaches under the counter, pulls out a bottle of ketchup, and offers it to Sans. The skeleton takes the plastic bottle and easily squeezes a good third of the contents into his mouth. You watch this entire transaction with an awed and slightly disgusted expression. When Sans notices, he winks at you and cheekily asks if you want some too. You shake your head with a wary face and say you’re fine with your normal cheeseburger. You take a bite of it to make your point but the delicious taste has you forgetting Sans’s weird ketchup fixation.

The rest of your meal goes pretty well, with amiable conversation between you and Sans. He says he works part time as a hotdog vendor, part time as a theoretical physicist. The unlikely combo spawns more questions from you and soon you find that you’ve been immersed in conversation for hours. It’s already well past 9 pm when you look at your watch and you are flabbergasted at how long you’ve stayed. It’s still a weekday and you’ve got work the next morning, so you say goodbye and thanks for the good talk to Sans. Before you leave though, Sans mumbles something. You didn’t quite catch that, you say, what did you need? Sans coughs a bit, then faces you a little more fully. “can i have your number?”

Oh. The question is unexpected and you blush slightly. Sans backpedals when he sees. “oh- uh, i meant just to chat, nothing weird. it was a good chat, ya know? it’d be cool to talk more. if you want.” It’s awkward but you calm down. Alright, exchanging numbers as platonic friends is ok, right? You clarify this with him. His grin falters a little but he doesn’t turn away. Yes, he says, platonic friends. You’re skeptical but still nod and pull out your phone. Numbers are swapped and you awkwardly say goodbye again. The walk back to your car is quick and you let out a big exhale when you get inside. Gripping the steering wheel, you blank out for a second before the nerves set in.

You've always been numb to romance. Sure, you've dated some people-a lot of people- in the past, but it all ended up boring you. What you thought was romantic interest was just infatuation and when you played the same song over and over for too long, it became stale and kind of annoying even. Sex wasn't that interesting to you anymore either. You've explored all the different kinks and joined a couple of communities, but now it's all boring again. There's no passion, no excitement.

So you don't date anymore. Er, well you still date, but they're more like playdates or one-night stands without the sex. You still want company, just not long-term company. It's just a lot easier to keep people at a distance and warn them that you're incapable of love. You've had a couple of challengers who thought that maybe they'd be the one to "change" you, like some protagonist in a shitty romcom. But it never worked. You never changed. And they just ended up falling in love, getting hurt, and then blaming you. Like you thought. So distance is best.

But with this new friend, you were nervous. Sans seemed like a genuinely cool dude and you thought he’d make a great friend eventually. But if he became interested in you, then you’d have to treat him like all your other suitors—kept at arm's’ length. Normally that would be no problem, but this time something held you back. It was a strange feeling and it left you wary. Could this be another infatuation disguised as love? You haven’t felt this strongly for someone else since...you don’t even remember when. But it’s troubling and you hate trouble.

By the time you make it home to your small apartment, your brain is fried. But you’ve come to a conclusion. No matter how strongly you felt for Sans, it still wasn’t enough to quell your suspicion that this was just another crush. You would treat this like any other potential “relationship” and keep away from getting too emotionally involved with him. Better safe than sorry. Finally convinced, you change into your pajamas, brush your teeth, and fall into bed. You drift to sleep, satisfied in knowing that nothing will change.

**Author's Note:**

> As a note, Reader isn't aro or ace. Or maybe a little. This is based off of my own experience and I don't really identify with either so take that as you will. Either way, I'm not going to label it when I'm not sure what exactly it is.
> 
> Frequency of updates will depend on how busy I am with work. But don't expect updates every day or even every week since I don't really have much inspiration either. Thanks for reading anyway.


End file.
